Creativity Distinction for Professor Almond Professor of Creative Writing and highly acclaimed author, David Almond, had his novel Skellig selected for the top 100 children’s novels to read by age 14. This unusual and captivating novel has also won both the Carnegie Medal and Whitbread Children’s Book Award. Professor Almond has written many novels, stories, and plays including The Savage, Clay, My Name in Mina, and My Dad’s a Birdman. In addition, in November 2013, Professor Almond was named as the winner of the annual Eleanor Farjeon Award. This award is made for distinguished service to the world of children’s books and is given to a person or an organisation whose commitment and contribution is deemed outstanding.
Libretto for opera ‘Dorian Gray’ Kate Pullinger, Professor of Creative Writing and Digital Media has written the Englishlanguage version of the opera, Dorian Gray composed by Lubica Cekovska. The opera opened in November 2013 in Bratislava and was reviewed in the New York Times which stated: “Ms. Cekovska’s easily grasped, mildly dissonant style, with lyrically oriented vocal lines, underscores, as far as it goes, the unsettling nature of Oscar Wilde’s sinister novel. Tension is created by steady drumbeats, insistent rhythms and swelling chords. Yet, Ms. Cekovska’s music at times was too tame for Wilde’s chilling tale — depraved, some would say — of a painting that mysteriously ages to reflect the increasingly twisted soul of its subject, the beguiling Dorian Gray, while he remains eternally young. The Canadian author Kate Pullinger solidly crafted the Englishlanguage libretto.”
Commenting on receiving this award, David said: “I am of course really delighted. This is a real honour. The award comes from the heart of the children’s book world, a world of great creativity and optimism, a world in which people genuinely believe that books and all forms of art can and do change people’s lives. I am proud to be part of it.”
Special issue of Little White Lies magazine BA (Hons) Graphic Communication graduates Robbie Wilkinson, Will Harvey, Patch Keyes and Eliot Wyatt were commissioned by Little White Lies Magazine to produce illustrations for a special 50th issue. The foursome were selected, along with 46 other artists, as representatives of ‘some of the best artists out there now’. The 50 artists were commissioned to produce new illustrations for the landmark issue, which has discarded the traditional format to create a compendium celebrating 50 years of amazing movies. This special issue is available to view in the University’s Sion Hill campus library.
He joins a prestigious list of previous winners including Quentin Blake, Malorie Blackman, Jacqueline Wilson and Philip Pullman.
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